


Without a Map or Guide

by ambyr



Category: Seraphina - Rachel Hartman
Genre: F/F, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-21
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-08-23 20:52:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8342275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambyr/pseuds/ambyr
Summary: Seraphina's moderately wicked stepsisters go missing in the castle, and she enlists Glisselda's help to find them.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [carpenter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpenter/gifts).



> There's a throw-away line in _Shadow Scale_ about Seraphina's stepmother's "notorious Belgioso family" and its "wily old aunties." I got to wondering what they were notorious for, and this was the result.

"And this," I said, throwing open the door with what I hoped was a dramatic flourish, "is the Blue Salon, where Queen Glisselda hosted nightly soirees when she was still only second heir."

My stepsisters oohed and aahed, gazing wide-eyed into the room. In truth the Blue Salon was shabbier than I remembered; since taking the throne, Glisselda had less time for parties, and when she did organize entertainments she had more impressive halls to use. With the chandeliers unlit, the room lacked some of its glitter. But there was still enough light coming through the windows to set the gilded pillars gleaming, and the maids kept the furniture free of dust. There was plenty to catch the eyes of two girls who had never visited the castle before. At my encouraging wave the twins ventured inside. Jeanne stroked one velvet pillow, while Tessie, always bolder, flung herself on the sofa with abandon.

I had promised them a castle tour for their eleventh birthday, but that day had come and gone in the tumult and tragedy of the previous year. They were closer to twelve, now, and giddy with the adulthood they felt was almost in reach. My own memory of that age was shadowed, thanks to Jannoula, and I did not always know how to connect with these laughing girls who seemed, overnight, to have shot up to near my height. My father and I had begun to bridge the distance created by a lifetime of secrets, but my sense of isolation from the rest of my family remained. Tessie and Jeanne, though, had agreed to the tour with enthusiasm and seemed to be enjoying it well enough. I considered that a promising start.

"Seraphina?" asked a nervous voice behind me.

I turned, leaving Tessie and Jeanne to continue their explorations of the Blue Salon alone, and found the scrawny sackbut player shifting from foot to foot.

"Pardon, second court composer, it's only that, well, Guntard isn't feeling well. We think perhaps it was the fish. Or the ale. Or, well, but what matters is that he was to play tomorrow, a solo that is, and. . . . "

His words trailed off into an imploring silence. I could hear my stepsisters through the Blue Salon's open door; there was rustling fabric, and Tessie exclaiming something about Auntie Marana. 

I wanted to return to them, so I took pity on the scrawny sackbut player and finished his plea for him. "And no one wants to be the one to inform Viridius."

He jerked his head in a quick nod.

I racked my head to remember the order of tomorrow's entertainment, organized in honor of Dame Okra Carmine's triumphant return as Ninysh ambassador. If we added another round of choral music, perhaps, and a reprise of one of the Ninysh dances—

"I'll take care of it," I promised. Finishing the tour should give me ample time to think through possible alterations before presenting them to Viridius and facing his inevitable dismay at having his plans overturned. 

The scrawny sackbut player babbled a relieved thanks and raced back the way he'd come, presumably to tell Guntard his salvation was at hand. I smiled wryly. As a putative saint, I still felt like a disappointment, but I could at least succeed as savior of hung-over musicians.

Still pondering possible musical adjustments, I turned back to the Blue Salon to gather up my stepsisters.

They were gone.

* * *

At first I imagined they might have gone in search of a garderobe, but when I ventured down the corridor and queried the closest guard, he reported seeing no sign of them. They seemed old for hiding games, but it was possible I had misjudged them. For lack of any better plan, I returned to the Blue Salon and began the process of checking under each sofa, feeling slightly absurd. 

"Tessie? Jeanne?" There was no response, not even a giggle.

I moved on to the panels of fabric that adorned the walls, rich brocade that, when pushed to the side, revealed itself to be rather less well-dusted than the furniture. I sneezed—then, as my watering eyes cleared, stared at the hidden door I'd revealed. There was dust behind the curtains as well as on them, and in the dust in front of the door were several scuffed child-sized footprints.

I knew better than to go wandering the secret passages of Castle Orison alone. I might live in the castle, but I had not grown up there. Without an experienced guide, I would be as lost as my stepsisters. Fortunately, I knew an expert. 

Unfortunately, he was nowhere to be found. Kiggs's tower was empty, and no one at the guard station had seen him since breakfast. Perhaps he was closeted with Glisselda in her study? But when I went to look, fretting at how far Tessie and Jeanne might have wandered in the time that had already passed, only Glisselda was there. She was hunched over her desk, so engrossed in her work that she didn’t seem to have noticed the ink spot on her chin, but she rose quickly when she saw me at the door.

"Seraphina!" She dropped her quill to clasp both my hands, and I smiled, touched by her enthusiasm. "Please tell me you've come with some distraction. Is there news from Porphyry? Has the Ardmagar inexplicably arrived drunken on our doorstep? Did the stage for Dame Okra’s welcome collapse and take our choir with it? Only give me a problem to solve—any would be better than this."

She waved her hand vaguely back toward her desk, on which was spread out a seating chart for Dame Okra Carmine's welcome dinner. Ordinarily, I thought such a task might have been passed to a lady in waiting, but in the aftermath of the war, with all its betrayals and unexpected changes of allegiance, arranging the representatives from Ninys, Samsam, Porphyry, and the Tanamoot was diplomacy of the highest stakes.

"Nothing quite as dire as that," I assured her. She let her expression fall comically, but turned more serious as I explained as quickly as I could the tale of my missing stepsisters. "And so I was hoping Kiggs might help me find them," I concluded.

"Lucian's gone to town," she said, pushing her chair in and coming around the desk to join me. "But do you know who's lived in the castle far longer than him, and knows the passages as well as her psalter?" There was a sparkle in her eye. "Me."

I thought about the papers on her desk, and almost asked if she could spare the time for an errand so trivial to the kingdom, if essential to me. But despite her grin there seemed to be something slightly brittle in her quick speech, and it occurred to me, belatedly, that she might have been hurt that I'd thought first of Kiggs. After all, it had not been so long since she had led me through the tunnels on the night I fled Jannoula’s grip. 

It was only that I had assumed she _must_ be busy, I told myself—but perhaps there had been more to my avoidance. I did not like to admit that, even to myself. I cared for Glisselda a great deal. Sorting out just what that meant, though, was difficult, and there had been so many difficulties in my recent life that it was easy to set aside one more for later. But no matter of the heart, as my father and I had learned, was ever resolved by silence and secrets. I resolved to do better—just as soon as my stepsisters were found.

"I commend myself to your guidance," I said, curtseying, and she laughed. Any brittleness, real or imagined, was gone.

"It's been too long since I've had an adventure, even in my own castle. So. Where do you think they might have gone?"

"Saints only know," I began, and then I remembered what I had overhead Tessie saying to Jeanne while I was in the hall and felt a more distant memory stirring. "Oh, no."

"Oh no, what?" Glisselda asked, cocking her head to one side.

"I don't think they're just wandering,” I said, piecing it together as I spoke. “I think they're searching for something. Before they vanished, Tessie," I concentrated, trying to remember the words, "said, 'it looks just like Auntie Marana told us.’ Auntie Marana Belgioso," I clarified, when Glisselda still looked mystified.

"As in, the infamous Ninysh Belgiosos?" Glisselda blinked. "I had no idea you were related."

"I'm not. My stepmother is. Not _all_ the scandal in my household is due to my own mother," I said, wryly. 

"That sounds like quite the tale! For later," she added hastily, catching something of my anxious expression. "So. What do you think their Auntie Marana could have told them that make them run off into the bowels of the castle?"

I knew, because I'd been there when she told them. Or at least, my body had. It had been the year I turned twelve, when Jannoula looked through my eyes more often than not, and my own memory was patchwork as consequence. I shivered, and Glisselda, concerned, laid a hand on my arm. Her warm touch brought me back to myself, and I marshaled what scraps of memory I had.

" _Her_ mother, great-auntie Elaine, was one of the original Belgiosos to be banished to Goredd. Before that, she spent a number of years as the assistant Ninysh ambassador. She was supposed to be spying on us, but when she learned the Goreddi court would pay just as well for the secrets of the Ninysh, well." I shrugged. There was a reason the Belgiosos were infamous.

"No doubt having connections here made her exile more comfortable."

"But not so comfortable as to find lodgings in the castle again—the Goreddi didn't trust her much more than the Ninysh did."

"I can't imagine why," Glisselda said solemnly, though the corners of her mouth twitched.

"No, indeed," I agreed. "But the important part of this story is that, while she was working at Castle Orison, Great-Auntie Elaine, according to Auntie Marana, hid a fortune in the castle. And, having worn out her welcome, was never able to retrieve it."

"So you think your wicked stepsisters have gone hunting for the treasure? Oh, this _will_ be an adventure! But where would Great-Auntie Elaine have hidden it? They must have some clue for them to go searching for it."

Glisselda's enthusiasm had been infectious, enough to briefly sweep away my lingering worries about my stepsister's safety, but now my throat closed again. "I—don't remember," I confessed. "When Auntie Marana told us the story, Jannoula was more in my head than I was. And, really, I never thought it was more than a story—."

Glisselda's hand was on my arm again, and I realized I was shaking. This time she pulled me close, and I let my chin rest on her shoulder for a moment. "Try?" she asked softly.

I breathed in the scent of her hair, which smelled of lavender, and tried. Slowly an answer came to me. "The crypts," I said. "She was supposed to have hidden it in the crypts."

* * *

"You can get to the crypts from the Blue Salon," Glisselda explained, "but this is much faster." That was good, since my stepsisters had by this point nearly an hour's head start on us. 

"You're assuming Tessie and Jeanne were able to find their way," I pointed out, as we turned a corner and pattered rapidly down a flight of stairs. It seemed likely, if they'd gone searching, that Auntie Marana had given them _some_ form of directions I couldn't recall, but that didn't mean they would be able to remember them clearly years after hearing them.

"True." She was ahead of me, but I could _hear_ her grin even without being able to see her face. "And if they weren't, we can backtrack to find them. I do know where the passage from the Blue Salon lets out. But just think of how much fun it will be if they _are_ there. I can't remember the last time I had a chance to play a prank on anyone."

I was so used to the serious young queen that I'd almost forgotten the playful girl I'd first met, when I came to the castle to audition for the role of her instructor. I realized, abruptly, how much I'd missed this side of her. And at least this prank didn't involve rotten fish guts.

Besides, I wouldn't mind getting back at my stepsisters for the worry they'd caused me.

"Here we are," she said, more quietly. "Be silent, now." She hung her lantern on an empty wall bracket, then stepped around the corner and cracked open a well-oiled door. She reached out and grasped my hand, and I followed her into darkness.

We had entered the crypt near the back, far from where Glisselda's mother and grandmother were entombed. I couldn't read the plaques in the dark, but even with light I was unsure I would have recognized all the names. This was a place of ancient history—one of Goredd's only such places, as being underground had spared it from burning during the centuries of dragon attacks. There was dust everywhere, darkness, and quiet.

And, ahead, a faint scratching sound. I _knew_ we were looking for my stepsisters, and I still almost jumped. Another noise. Another. Then Tessie let out a word I was certain my stepmother wished she didn't know. I squeezed Glisselda's fingers, and she squeezed them back—then let go and stepped away.

"Whooooo," Glisselda moaned, as she moved toward the twins. "Whoooo daaaares?"

If she had meant to scare them with voice alone, I'm not sure it would have done the trick. Even—perhaps especially—pretending to be a ghost, Glisselda couldn't quite disguise her amusement. But she had powdered her face stark white from hairline to chin, and when those aristocratic features—a perfect match for half the effigies in the crypt—came into the dim circle of light cast by the twins’ lamp, I fancied their shrieks could have been heard all the way back to the Blue Salon. With lungs like those, perhaps I should be auditioning _them_ for the choir.

Tessie bolted. Jeanne froze. And the chest they had been holding between them—which I had only just crept close enough to see—crashed to the ground. The much-aged wood chose that moment to crack and spill its contents all over the crypt floor. Even in the light of the single torch, the sparkle of jewels was unmistakable.

"The treasure was _real_?" I exclaimed, destroying any attempt at concealment. Glisselda, all effort at ghostly pretense over, started laughing in earnest. She was still laughing when Tessie crept shamefacedly back and began, under my instruction, to gather up the mess of bracelets, rings, and medals.

* * *

The jewelry was clearly not Goreddi work; each piece was adorned with a profusion of colors that would have looked gaudy even on a Goreddi stage. Tessie insisted that it must have been Great-Auntie Elaine's, hidden to protect it from her own countrymen, but I had my doubts about the honesty of its provenance. Dame Okra Carmine, once summoned to Glisselda's study, confirmed them.

"This is an heirloom of the Pesavolta family," she declared indignantly, holding one emerald- and amethyst-encrusted bracelet to the light. "One that hasn't been seen since my late husband's day. How did _you_ get your hands on it? And what is wrong with your face?"

"We found it in the crypts," Glisselda said diplomatically, ignoring the second question, "with the help of these two fine young women. I'm sure they would also be pleased to help you clean and catalog each piece, so you can return them to their rightful owners." 

None of us mentioned the Belgioso connection. An afternoon with a cranky Dame Okra would, I felt, be enough punishment for Tessie and Jeanne even without their heritage being revealed to the prickly Ninysh ambassador. She swept off with the twins in her wake, and Glisselda closed the door firmly behind her.

"What _is_ wrong with my face?" Glisselda asked, picking up a letter opener from her desk and trying to catch a reflection in its polished blade.

"You got the powder off before we called Dame Okra," I admitted, “but not the ink stain under it.”

"And you didn't say anything?"

"You were doing such a good job putting the fear of Allsaints into the twins, I was afraid to interrupt and spoil the effect. No one but Dame Okra Carmine would have noticed, I'm sure. Here." I withdrew a handkerchief, dipped it into the glass of water at her desk, and dabbed at Glisselda's chin. I could feel her relax into my touch.

"I needed that," she said, eyes fluttering shut. "I want to be a good queen. A great queen. But I can't be _only_ the queen. I need to be Glisselda, too."

"I know," I told her, and I did. I remembered my time as the Counter-Saint, and the weight of expectation to fill a role, rather than be a person. I started to pull my handkerchief away, and she reached up to cover my hand with her own.

"Sometimes it's hard," she said quietly. "Letting you and Lucian have all the fun. Letting you and Lucian—"

She didn't finish the sentence, but I flinched anyway. I remembered my earlier resolution not to hide my feelings under silence—even if I still didn’t know quite what those feelings were. I remembered, suddenly, my conversation with Comonot at Lab Four. At the time, I had found his assertion that Eskar’s interest in Orma was no barrier to her interest in him absurd. Now, though, I wondered. _Sometimes our reason will lead us to the same morality as your empathy and feeling, and sometimes it won’t_ , he had said. I was half dragon. Was it possible for me to follow the same path of reasoning? I was Comonot's teacher, but perhaps he had something to teach me in turn. 

Slowly, so as not to make Glisselda think I was pulling away again, I shifted my hand, tilting her face toward mine.

"We'll have to find a way to share the fun, then," I said. Her eyes were closed, which helped me gather up the courage to bend forward and kiss her. She made a small squeak of surprise and flung her arms around me. I teetered, surprised at her weight, and in my flailing broke off the kiss.

"Not quite how I'd pictured that," I said, ruefully.

"We'll have to try again," Glisselda said immediately. "That is. If you liked it."

I had seldom heard her so hesitant. "I liked it," I said, and I had. I liked the lavender scent of her, and the way her hair fell across both our faces.

"Oh," she said, a little wonderingly, and moved toward me again—which was, of course, when the page boy rapped on her door.

"Saint Daan in a pan," she exclaimed, with a guilty look at the seating chart still unfinished on her desk. "Sometimes Aunt Laurel's plan to run off to sea sounds better and better."

"We'd have to leave Kiggs behind," I said. "He gets terribly seasick. Besides, you want to be a great queen."

"I do," she agreed. "And I doubt a life on the waves would provide enough music for you."

"You might be surprised," I started, remembering the Porphyrian sailor's sea shanties, and then I remembered, as well, what the discovery of the treasure had driven clear out of my mind—my now long-postponed conversation with Viridius, for which I had done no planning at all. I groaned as the page boy knocked again. "You might as well answer that. I've remembered I have urgent business with Viridius."

And then, so Glisselda would not think I was attempting to avoid her, I kissed her again--briefly, but without stumbling. 

”Oh, well. If it’s urgent,” she said with a sigh. As she walked to the door, she straightened, looking more and more the queen with each step. I was proud of her strength and determination—but I wanted to make time and space for the laughing girl she had been that afternoon as well.

"I still want to know where the passage from the Blue Salon goes," I told her. "And I'm told you're the best guide for these things."

She stopped, hand on the door, and turned back to me. For one moment the queen vanished under an irrepressible smile. "After Dame Okra Carmine's banquet," she said.

"After the banquet," I agreed, and went to find Viridius.


End file.
